To make a long story short, my Dad thought it should be real quick to do the dishes since we had a dishwasher and I was “home 24/7” (this was back during when everyone was at home and I was in the middle of university online). Problem was that we only had one sink and half the dishes used during the day couldn’t even go in the dishwasher/fit. Such as the pots and pans Mom used to make dinner from steamed vegetables with mashed potatoes and breaded chicken, to homemade meatballs with sauce and pasta.

Often, these dishes would pile up, get all crusty and gross, after two days because I had zero free time. Then I’d have to spend over an hour scrubbing, filling the dish rack with sudsy dishes that only made up half the pile, rinsing those dishes, then repeat. While doing balancing online classes, homework with strict deadlines, studying, and serious cabin fever.

When my Dad made that comment for the fifth time in a month, (Dad who sits on his ass the moment he comes home from his shift working a vacuum truck), I said “Fine”.

So, I started the dishes, right in front of him, and at the 29 minute mark I’d only scrubbed three pots and two pans, and a ceramic mug. Not even rinsed. The moment the 30 minutes was up, I washed the soap off my hands, cleaned the sink, and left the soap covered dishes in the dish rack, and went to do my homework. Dad, of course, started yelling at me. I just said “you said thirty minutes. I did thirty minutes.”

Mom backed me, having gotten sick of the fights. Dad got madder, but just stormed off to his man cave. After an hour, I went back to the sink, rinsed the now soap sticky dishes, which took a bit, dried them, then i got through the lunch containers that couldn’t go in the dishwasher because it would crack them, and they were rinsed by the thirty minute mark. So I left them in the dish rack to dry.

The next day, I did exactly the pots that were needed (three), plus the containers needed for leftovers, and left the rest. And repeated that pattern for the next weeks. Thus, there was a pile of dishes that would build up, I’d take what would be needed that day out to wash in the 30 minutes, and leave the rest because “it should only take 30 minutes”.

Note that each time I had to refill the sink with hot soapy water, then drain it, then fill it with warm water to rinse. Normally I’d do the pots/pans in one massive load, using the unloaded dishwasher as an extra dish rack to fit them all, then once they were all scrubbed and the water was nasty, rinse out the sink, rinse the pots/pans, and dry most of them and put them away. Then I’d do the containers, mugs, and whatever else couldn’t go in the dishwasher, and after rinsing leave them in the dish rack to air dry. And if needed do a third round of this. I would only have to do this every few days, which allowed me to work on homework and get assignments in on time (mainly one weekday I didnt have classes and either Saturday or Sunday). Mom had been fine with it, and if she needed certain pots she’d give me a heads up and I’d have those ones cleaned and drying in the dish rack for when she got home, which only took 20 minutes, while leaving the rest of the dishes for later.

Now, i was spending ten minutes filling, emptying/wiping down the sink, and refilling for rinse in thirty minutes. Got the pots/containers of the day if I was lucky they weren’t super sticky/stubborn. But the rest of the pile was left. Then I’d get the different pots needed for the next day, maybe the containers, while the pots used the night before would sit. And the mugs, water bottles, etc that were not needed for making dinner/storing food were just left.

After a couple months of this, Dad finally broke (either he got tired of needing to wash his own coffee mug for the mornings after he’d run out of clean mugs, or Mom got through his thick skull, idk), and told me to just “go back to washing them like before”.

It took me three hours to get through the pile of mugs, containers, pots, pans, etc, with the last load being left to air dry. Mom made Dad help me by drying and putting dishes away after i rinsed.

Dad hasn’t made a comment about how long dishes have taken since!